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Published: August 6th 2007
Evening folks. Tonight is a momentous night. It is the last night of our entire travels that we will be spending with someone we know. After this we are back out on our own camping, driving and generally misbehaving all by ourselves. We're spent the last few nights with Emma (and her husband Greg), a friend of Cathy's from when they both attended the nun school back in Southampton.
We landed here on Tuesday evening after a busy day of travelling and sightseeing. The evening was nice and quiet with the ladies catching up on old times. Emma was working the next day so we were entertaining ourselves. We headed off to one of the theme parks on the Gold Coast - Dreamworld.
Pretty good place is Dreamworld. It's not quite as big as our very own Alton Towers but the rides are alright. They have 5 big rides which I was looking forward to tackling almost as much as Mrs Deane wasn't. We started gentle though with a half hour IMax show all about Australia. Really very good. After that we started warming it up a little with the river rapids ride. Wandered off to the Big Brother
studios as they film it here and had a gander. Much like the show back home with a bunch of celeb-hungry wannabies talking behind eachothers backs. The Davina over here is rubbish though. And theres no Dermot O'Leary. Sorry ladies.
And then it was on to The Long Drop, sorry, The Giant Drop. A very simplistic ride. You get taken straight up a big pole to 120m (38 storeys), held there for 20 seconds and then dumped straight back down. We both really enjoyed it, particularly as Mrs Deane chickened out and stayed at ground level to watch.
After a very wet go on the log flume we headed to the animal section to dry off a little. We saw all the koalas, kangaroos and dingoes and then watched the crocodile feeding sesison with Goliath (the crocodile) jumping about 3m out of the water to grab some KFC. Had a spot of lunch next - luckily I didn't have to jump 3m in the air to get my sandwich.
We then polished off the rest of the rides including The Claw, Wipeout, Cyclone and the Tower of Terror (like the old thunderlooper at Alton Towers). The Tower
of Terror uses the same big pole as the Long Drop and is fairly fast (160kph).
After a few rides Mrs Deane wanted something more sedate so we headed to the tiger show to watch them jump around, climb trees and maul their trainers. After the show Mrs Deane surprised me. She said she wanted to go for the Long Drop. So off we went. As we were dangling 120m in the air I think she regretted her decision. All worked out for the best though and we even went on twice. Well done Mrs Deane. Headed home tired for a nice chilled evening.
The next day is something that Mrs Deane (Mum that is) would have definitely appreciated. Wine tour time. Emma was our excellent chauffeur for the day and took us up to Mount Tamborine to the Hinterland wine region. We covered 4 vineyards and a distillary as well as a fudge shop and cheese place but the ladies were very upset when we found the chocolate place had closed down. The wines were delicious and we purchased a few bottles - purely to help the lcoal economy obviously. Scenery was stunning and we could see
all the way out to the Surfers Paradise skyline about 40km away to the east.
The most entertaining stop of the day was the distillary, run by a part Russian guy and his crazy family. They seemed to love everyone coming in to sample their drinks - they produce a huge variety of flavoured spirits and liqueurs and recently won a gold medal in Europe for their absinthe (very potent). They had us in circles downing shots of all sorts of flavoured stuff. Lunch was at our 3rd winery overlooking a beautiful duck pond and with views out into the fields below. Very nice. On the way back we dropped in to the supermarket for some purchases so that Cathy and I could rustle up a quick lamb roast.
We had a quiet night as we were up the next day to head out surfing. I had to pull out due to my long standing sports injury but the ladies were signed up for a two hour surf lesson on the famous beach at Surfers. I was official photographer - apologies if I didn't make them look like proffessionals. You can only work with what you've got.
They both seemed to really enjoy it and were both cream crackered by the end of it. They both agreed that the waves were about 15 foot high and there was a tricky undercurrent that was putting them off a little. They are still a little sore now, three days after the event so it must have been tough. My role as official photographer was also very tough.
Whilst they aren't yet ready to go pro they weren't too bad. Mrs Deane will continue practicing with my high tech bodyboard over the next few weeks. After a quick Hungry Jacks (thats Burger King to you uncivilised sorts out there) it was home so that the ladies could rest (sleep) before a night out at the Draculas cabaret show.
Draculas is part cabaret, part comedy, part musical, part opera type thing with a three course dinner thrown in as well. All the cast and waiters are dressed as vampire type people - a bit like the rocky horror show I suppose (but I've never seen that). Really good night as the show was really good, the food was top notch as well.
Saturday was our trip to South
Stradbroke Island. It's a smaller, less touristy version of Fraser Island. Made entirely of sand and not really populated it makes for a really good day out. It's a ferry ride across to a resort over there. Once there we started with a half hour relaxation session (with a quick swim for me) before a nice bbq lunch. After lunch we were on a tractor to take us over to the surf beach. It looked about 20 miles long and you could see back to the skyline of Surfers in the distance.
The tractor driver gave us each a bodyboard and we set off to sand toboggan. Brilliant. Ran up a huge sand dune (well ran for three yards before we got too tired and then we just struggled up the rest) and dived on our boards to coast down. You can get a decent bit of speed up too. The only down side is dragging your sorry butt back up the hill for the next go. Pretty darn tiring.
Once we were back at the resort we got out on the water in a paddle boat thing to see the island from the sea. Took it very
gentle due to the tired surfing limbs. Ferry back and then another chilled evening with some cheese, crackers and red wine. Not bad.
Today was Emma's rest day from tour guide duties so Mrs Deane & I set off into the Hinterland again in search of nature. We headed out to the Springbrook national park to go trekking through rain forest, watching the waterfalls and marvelling at the views from the numerous lookouts. Lunch was at a nice country cafe where we ate well and played a couple games of chess.
We started out at the Natural Bridge - a very funky rock formation that looks like a bridge, naturally. We then headed round to some of the nice waterfalls. They're all reached by treks through the rainforest which were pretty nice. There were also about half a dozen lookouts where you could see out over the valleys and over to the coastline 40kms away in the distance. The best one we saved for last. It was called 'the best of all' lookout so we were hoping for big things. Not to be as the mist had rolled in and we saw absolutely nothing. Apart from the sign
telling us where Byron Bay was, 50km away in the mist.
It was then home again and a bit of relaxation before we head off north again tomorrow evening. Been a great few days at the Yates' - another fine hostel to add to our list. Our hosts have been great and looked after us very well. It's been action packed days and nice relaxing evenings, exactly as we wanted. Thanks guys.
Almost forgot - Eurovision is on here as well. With the one and only Terry Wogan hosting as well. The 100th beer got sunk whilst that blokey woman from Serbia warbled her way to victory. A travesty.
Following hot on the heels of the Golden Logies here in Oz (they're a bit like the BAFTAS) we're hosting the Golden Bloggies. Yes, the awards that celebrate the great and good of the humble blog. Most of the winners will just be chosen by me but there are some that you can vote for. As I know nobody will vote for them, I'll probably choose them as well. Here are the categories you can vote for and the nominees:
Best Blog Writer: Mr Deane or Mrs Deane
Best Photographer: Mr Deane or Mrs Deane or Random-passers-by
Favourite blog: Just choose your favourite
Best Location: Thailand or Vietnam or Cambodia or Laos or Malaysia or Singapore or Australia
Best Male: Mr Deane or Mr Deane-Oz or Mr G (orangutan) or Matt (workshy Aussie) or James Reid or Adam or Greg
Best Female: Mrs Deane or Mrs Deane-Oz or Miss Deane-Oz or Danielle or Lesley Reid or Jenny or Emma Yates or Rosalinda (orangutan / mother-in-law)
If you put in any votes you're likely to swing the whole thing as there won't be many of you voting.
Anyway, see you in the north for more fun and adventures.
Mr & Mrs Deane
Beer 97: Boag's Strongarm Bitter, Australia, Bottle, 5.5%!,(MISSING) 8.0, Another quality product from Boag's - probably my favourite beer producer over here
Beer 98: VB Original Ale, Australia, Bottle, 4.6%!,(MISSING) 7.5, Better than the standard VB
Beer 99: XXXX Bitter, Australia, Bottle, 6.5%!,(MISSING) 7.0, OK - better than standard XXXX but not by much
Beer 100: Coopers Best Extra Stout, Australia, Bottle, 6.3%!,(MISSING) A big meaty stout to round off an excellent 100 beers - the challenge is
still going well
P.S. too much effort to keep track of all the lettuce so I'll skip those out from now.
P.P.S. Hope you enjoy the bonanza of photos
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Dave Cathy
Dave & Cathy
Blog Awards...
Sa, sorry you are the only saddo to enter so far so no the votes have not been counted yet. You'll need to hassle the other dedicated readers and get them to vote too. Keep up the good work.